The Stage

This is an open discussion forum for users to discuss WebRing features, wishes, thoughts, etc. QUESTIONS about and PROBLEMS with the System should be posted in detail using the support forums in Help. Negative, derogatory or personal comments will be deleted. Sadly, due to spamming and anonymous trashing of other users we have had to restrict posting to signed in members.

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A few permanent posts to illustrate the feature

Re (3403): Nav bar NEXT goes to hub page.

Thanks. Knocking the cookie security down from medium to low in the interne

Re (3401): Nav bar NEXT goes to hub page.

Two possible reasons:
1. you're site is not asctive in the ring currently

can't upload logos?

Is there a problem with logo uploading? When is the best time to upload?

WebRing Just Committed Suicide
- 09/29/2006"As New York said earlier in a post that was quietly removed," ... huh! What do you know - they did delete it and certainly not at my request! Talk about tipping your hand!

Opossumsal had accounced her departure from the Webring system over on the Webring Manager's forum (id=managers). Webring urged her to stay, telling her that she never knew what might happen in the next 15 months. I pointed out that if you look at their response to her, that they didn't actually promise anything. Just stick around, they say. "For what, specifically" would be the obvious question.

I then mentioned the concept of "toughing it out". The idea is that if you have a change that people are going to find unacceptable, you stall them long enough that many will start thinking of the unacceptable as being part of the statu quo, and stop questioning it. Instead of having all of the protests arrive at once aad get noticed, by stalling one can get them to come in a few at a time, as people one by one see that they were just being played when they were asked to be "patient". One can then create the illusion that a frustrated and angry majority is nothing more than a disgruntled minority, fooling the many into thinking that they're basically alone in their dissatisfation when they're not.

It's a dandy tool for manipulating the masses, which in this case would be us. How interesting that they would delete the mention of this practice so quickly. I guess the reference to Richard Nixon hit a little too close to home? (I'm told that the expression "toughing it out" originated with his administration). They seem to be very nervous about their users being reminded of that particular method of rhetorical crowd control.

I take that as a sign that this is exactly what they have in mind - stall and spread out the complaints, until the protest runs out of steam. Now, let's see how long this post stays up, before it gets "quietly removed" as well. :)

Replied
- 09/29/2006For a long time Ringmasters were afraid to speak out about the foul way that WebRing has been managed. Many of us felt that we had too much to lose if we spoke up, so we remained silent when others were victimised and we said nothing when managers treated us with rank discourtesy and petty spite. Bizarrely, WebRing came to the conclusion that this fear-induced lack of complaint was a sign of loyal enthusiasm for what they were doing.

Wake up Tim, we know that the system is run by mean and unkind people who have only got away with their unacceptable behavior because they have their fingers on all the DELETE buttons.

Can't you see that many of the people who are giving up their rings are actually relieved to be out of the horrible atmosphere that you and your gang have created here?

You have insulted, terrorised and misled all of us and you have allowed your cronies to victimise users for personal reasons. Now you come to us and demand that we pay for the privilege of remaining under the whips of your unreasonable helpers.

Think again. You have lost the plot. Nobody is going to give you a thin dime under these circumstances. If you were motivated by real community spirit instead of greed, you would scrap this plan, fire the managers and give the system back to the people who really stand for its true meaning.

Your TOS offer no guarantees, no security and no right to redress or a fair hearing; what makes you think that anybody could be foolish enough to pay for that kind of 'service'? Ringmasters are voting with their feet and you are going to lose everything.

Webring is dead. There is no point in managing rings that are going to be taken away and handed over to spammers and scammers (the only people who will want them)in January.

Replied
- 09/29/2006Has anyone ever thought about the posibility that this might be their intention? Given that 1. most of the sites here are free, 2. most people have more than one site, and 3. you're being limited, on the highest level of membership to 50 - maybe they're intentionally limiting, or killing themselves. Think about it? If you had created a beautiful webring world, and for some reason it's changing, and it's not a direction you would like, what would you do? Delete or sabotage your ring, so no one else can have your hard work, or let someone else adopt your baby?

Replied
- 09/30/2006You have to understand that WebRing has been planning this holocaust for a long time. With the aid of a few toadies and ass-kissers, they attempted to tell us that measures like 'Uniqueness Ratings' were for our own good (just as they are now claiming that the current bout of throat-cutting and blackmail is bestowing lavish 'benefits' upon us). Some of their pet ring managers (they don't deserve to be called ringMASTERS) were plainly informed in advance. The traitors in our midst know who they are; if the rest of us call to mind the names of people who started giving up rings several months ago, it is not hard to draw up a list.

WebRing simply DOESN'T CARE about our opinions, rights or feelings. As far as the System Dictators are concerned, we are non-entities and they aren't worried about missing our presence here. They figure that the protest will go away and that WebRing is so big that it can stand to lose thousands of members. What they don't fully realise is that a vast amount of the daily upkeep at WebRing is done by a relatively small hard core of experienced ringmasters. When that invaluable resource walks out of the door, this place will be largely in the hands of very green, inexperienced and rudderless novices. Many of them will be only interested in selling their products and services; the hobbyists, enthusiasts and good people who only wanted to share with others will have no place here. The community as we knew it is already well on the way to death.

The system is bleeding to extinction. Our mailboxes are full of invitations to adopt abandoned rings; but nobody wants them. Why invest more time and effort in rings that are going to be stolen in January?

Replied
- 09/30/2006I was a member of over 600 webrings and I got rid of most of them leaving maybe about ten memberships to two different rings up. I had 42 rings that I managed. Guess what happened to those rings? 40 of them were deleted outright and two remain with me because they had the highest membership. I deleted some that I put my heart and soul into and rather than allowing someone else to take over and probably end up losing it in January when they don't realize that they need to pay to have more than two rings, the ring will be deleted by them; I rather do it myself. I hope 'system' decides to take a look at all the adoption pages on Webring and sees the massive amounts of members putting their rings up for adoption and tells his superiors about this and sees what they do probably nothing but a shrug and a comment that they will be picked up by someone who will pay the amount to have more than two rings. I don't think so. I hate to admit this but Webring is now dying a slow death and it is thanks to this new policy.

Replied
- 09/30/2006I dropped all WebRing memberships and rings except one. I also posted on eBay's About Me page Discussion Board about the upcoming webring changes. There are a lot of eBayer's that are not going to be happy about this.

Replied
- 10/01/2006I manage one webring, and have 35 webring memberships in various rings, most of which seem to be low-priority rings that people are going to dump in response to this. For me, WebRing was a nice, low-key community that let me link to other people with similar interests without having to constantly search for links myself. A webring banner could add a little color to a page along with telling visitors where they could go to find more of the same things they liked on my site.

Now I have to decide which of the 30 of my 35 memberships have to go. I'm absolutely disgusted by that. Obviously, any ring that goes up for adoption as a result of this is going to get dropped. But this is making me also have to pull out of communities that I value and consider important.

I've NEVER been in any of this for the money. I never even cared that WebRing has been saying, practically since I got here, that I have some kind of 70 cent credit (whatever good that might do) on my account. This was about art and community. The two things that are now being sacrificed to the almighty dollar, apparently.

I'll probably hold onto my one webring for the moment... but this is going to be pathetic and a slaughter. I hope, at least, that Webring's stingy terms are also reflected in dropping the asinine "you must belong to X number of rings before you can make a ring, and your ring must have X number of members or it won't be valid" rules, because if they haven't, that'll probably take out everything that's left once the massacre is over.

It was nice knowing you guys. Maybe I'll see you elsewhere on the internet, but this place has just tossed everything I respected about it.